Consider This from NPR - Post-Roe America: A Chaotic Patchwork Of Litigation

Episode Date: July 5, 2022

Trigger bans. Restraining orders. State and local disputes. New fights about old laws. After Roe, states are awash in abortion-related legal challenges. Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer tells NPR 'there's a lot of confusion,' and 'it's a terribly anxious time.' The chaos has trickled down from state courts to individual abortion care providers, where staff and patients have been struggling to adjust to rapidly-changing legal realities. NPR's Sarah McCammon visited one provider in Shreveport, Louisiana. The shifting legal realities could make accessing abortion care difficult for members of the military who are stationed in certain states. NPR's Brian Mann spoke to women in the military about their concerns. In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This message comes from Indiana University. Indiana University performs breakthrough research every year, making discoveries that improve human health, combat climate change, and move society forward. More at iu.edu slash forward. Hours after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Ohio made abortions after approximately six weeks illegal. This decision returns abortion policy to the place it has always belonged, to the elected policy branches of government. That's Ohio's Attorney General Dave Yost. Ohio's six-week ban, which Yost set in motion, was actually passed in 2019,

but it had been on hold until the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade. Roe was poorly reasoned, a doctrine of shifting sands that invited nonstop litigation. Nonstop litigation has also described the weeks since Roe was struck down. Eleven states, including Texas, Oklahoma, and Alabama, had what's called trigger laws. Some went into effect immediately after Roe was overturned, banning abortion in most circumstances. This is another step towards shutting down all abortion clinics unless they want to face the consequences of us suing them, at least civilly. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton acknowledged that local officials in Texas, as in other places, have pledged not to enforce state abortion laws. The Austin City Council may try to decriminalize abortion.

Meanwhile, in the past week, a Texas judge put that state's trigger law on hold. As of Tuesday afternoon, state judges have also paused abortion restrictions in Louisiana. Abortions resumed after a state court judge temporarily blocked Louisiana's trigger law. Utah. The judge granted the restraining order, but it's only good for the next 14 days. And Kentucky. Kentucky's only two abortion clinics will reopen after a judge temporarily blocked the state's trigger law today. Trigger laws, restraining orders, state and local disputes, and new fights about old legislation.

There's a lot of confusion, you know, in the medical establishment. There's a lot of confusion that women and our families are feeling. And it's a terribly anxious time right now for all of us. Michigan's governor, Democrat Gretchen Whitmer, told NPR she's trying to keep an abortion ban from taking effect, a ban that was passed in 1931. Right now, the state's been enjoined from enforcing that old law while state Republicans and anti-abortion groups pursue legal challenges. Should that injunction fall, we revert overnight back to a 1931 law that would make it a felony, no exceptions for rape or incest, one of the most extreme laws in the country.

Consider this. The Supreme Court decision overturning Roe was the end of federally protected abortion rights. But it was only the beginning of a new and complicated chapter in this story. A chaotic and rapidly changing patchwork of legal fights unfolding from state to state. From NPR, I'm Elsa Chang. It's Tuesday, July 5th. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally, and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply.

It's Consider This from NPR. If you're watching the news from afar, stories about restraining orders, injunctions, and legal challenges can make all of this seem sort of abstract. But if you're watching that news in the waiting room of a Louisiana abortion care provider, it is not abstract to say. That was office manager Steffi Chaffee watching a story on the local news about her practice, Hope Medical Group. Late last month, its lawyer successfully convinced a judge to pause Louisiana's trigger law. The judge scheduled a hearing for early July, and in the meantime, staff tried to get back in touch with

patients they had previously turned away. Kathleen Pittman is the administrator at Hope Medical in Shreveport, where she's worked for 30 years. We're contacting them and trying to put them back on the schedule as quickly as we can. At the same time, news spread quickly that they were starting procedures again, which was great news for people who could reschedule canceled appointments. But people who were calling the practice for the first time, well, Steffi Chaffee had to tell them that they were probably out of luck. Yeah, honey, we got a temporary restraining order, so we're back to being able to schedule. What, did you have an appointment with us or what?

Do you mean for your first visit? Okay, well, we're not scheduling for first visits right now, honey. We're already booked up. So, well, I understand, honey, the whole thing isn't fair. But if you want to call next Friday. But even for patients who might have been able to get an appointment in theory, the reality is some are now too far along in their pregnancies to be seen. Others have already traveled too far away to return in time. Some of them won't be able to make it back.

Truth be told, we know this. Kathleen Pittman spoke to NPR's Sarah McCammon, who was there at Hope Medical in Shreveport this past Monday morning, and has this story. Hope Medical in Shreveport this past Monday morning, and has this story. At Hope Medical Group for Women, things were almost back to normal this morning, at least a new normal. Thank goodness. I was just really happy to hear that I could still come. Jay, a patient who asked us to call her only by her first initial because she's worried about stigma in her small Texas town, was relieved when she got word she could still come today. At 27, she's a mom to three young boys already.

She says she has a history of difficult pregnancies, which have landed her in the hospital again and again. I want to walk away from this feeling better because right now I feel extremely sick and I'm unable to function and take care of my kids that I do have. Jay had been watching the Supreme Court closely and had scheduled a backup appointment at a clinic in New Mexico in case abortion became illegal here in Louisiana. I was really scared. I thought I was going to have to travel 12 hours to Albuquerque because of Roe v. Wade being overturned. I had a panic attack that day. But along with about three dozen other patients, she was able to get in for her procedure today. And then you'll saw at the top. Make sure your phone is on silent for the time and no pictures.

Staff members have been busy helping patients get checked in and making calls to schedule more procedures through next week. The judge has given them at least until July 8th, when a hearing is scheduled. Even so, clinic workers are being incredibly careful. Outside in the parking lot, Jamie Cantrell, a volunteer escort, says she tells patients to back into the parking spaces so their license plates aren't available. Sometimes folks will come out with cameras and take photographs.

Louisiana's Republican attorney general has said he will fight to defend the state's abortion bans. Sarah Zagorski, communications director with Louisiana Right to Life, says she's confident abortion will soon be banned here. It's going to get dismissed and our Louisiana law will stand. There's nothing vague about our 2022 reaffirmation of Human Life Protection Act. In our opinion, they're just really pulling at straws to try to keep their doors open. Clinic administrator Kathleen Pittman acknowledges she may have to close her doors eventually, but in the nearly three decades she's worked here, she's learned to stay focused on what's in front of her now. It's just a way of life.

I can't imagine coming to work in the morning and not having something hanging over my head. So we're concentrating on our patients right now, doing the best we can for them, and we'll deal with whatever we need to deal with as it comes. That report was from NPR's Sarah McCammon in Shreveport, Louisiana. A complicated patchwork of laws means some abortion patients will have to seek care in another state. That happened just this past week when a 10-year-old girl from Ohio who was a victim of sexual assault and was six weeks and three days pregnant reportedly had to travel to neighboring

Indiana for an abortion. For adult patients, major companies like Disney, Meta, and JPMorgan Chase have told employees that they will help pay for them to travel for abortion care. But many people don't have employers like that. Like, take those serving in the military. Women make up nearly one in five service members, and many of them are now required to serve in states where abortions are banned. The Defense Department says it is working to develop policies for them, but as NPR's Brian Mann reports,

many women don't believe that they will be protected. Midmorning Bailey, Derby, a soldier stationed at Fort Drum near Watertown, New York, is at a farmer's market a few miles from her base. She's furious about last week's Supreme Court decision. I think it's horrible. They're bringing the church into the government, which is what our country was not founded on. Religious freedom is what our country was founded on and is what I fight for.

Abortion services are still legal here, but many of the nation's biggest military bases are located in parts of the U.S. where abortions are now banned under state law, and soldiers are moved around a lot in their careers. I asked Thurby how she would react if ordered to serve in one of those bases. I would not be comfortable at all. Personally, I don't want kids at all, and due to my sexuality, if I were to have a kid, it would be very traumatic for me. Under federal law, abortion services are provided within the military health care system in extremely rare cases. Women who want abortions almost always have to go off base. Defense

Secretary Lloyd Austin released a statement after Roe was struck down, saying the military is, quote, But many military women, service members, and spouses are skeptical. Any optimism or any hope now that the military will handle this the right way is incredibly fleeting to the point that it's really not even worth considering. This is a former soldier and West Point graduate who's married to an army officer. She asked her name not be used because she fears speaking out on such a politically and culturally fraught issue could impact her husband's career in the military. She believes any abortion-related promises made now

by the military could be quickly reversed if a Republican administration takes over. She also fears women service members will face new pressure from officers, often men, who wield significant influence over medical care sought by those under their command. How you approach the situation as a woman who needs reproductive care will vary enormously depending on who your commander is, depending on what you know about their religious persuasions, their political persuasions. Military women interviewed for this story say even if the Defense Department accommodates women who wish to travel for abortions, those medical services won't be covered by the military's health insurance program. That means serious financial burdens for military families who are often low income.

Back at the farmer's market near Fort Drum, Chantelle Bogie is buying pizza for her two kids. She's the wife of a career soldier, and she, too, is angry. I mean, it's ridiculous. I don't see why a bunch of men get a say in what women do for religious reasons. It makes no sense. Bogie says she and her husband expect to be ordered to serve in states where abortions are banned before his career is over. They've already discussed what they'll do. I'm originally from Colorado, so no, if I desperately decided I wanted one, I'd just go home. But Bogie says many women in the military community

can't rely on family living in states where abortion remains legal for that kind of support. That was NPR's Brian Mann. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Elsa Chang.